a/n: thank you for clicking on my story! i'm back to writing fanfics after a ten year hiatus, so any and all feedback/reviews are appreciated greatly.

This Isn't a Dream

By now, you'd think I'd be used to the constant game; Dancing around the flame, never to be burnt. But the fire couldn't be this painful. Life is cruel and death is kind, after all. Standing back and listening, I feel her every day. She pushes someone else away, she politely declines, she laughs off their passes. I should be used to this game, but I'm not.

Astrid are the closest friend I have, save for Toothless of course, and there's nothing that can say otherwise. There isn't another person in this world I would rather be closer to. As I stand in front of her house tonight, I'm searching for the perfect words. I'm not very good at words; this isn't a dream and they won't just come to me at the right moment.

Suddenly, I hear footsteps on the ground and I can smell the perfume of the oil she puts in her hair. It's intoxicating.

I look up and there she is, standing in front of me, braided blonde hair and sparkling blue eyes, with a half-teasing smile on her face.

"If you weren't my best friend, Hiccup, I'd be slightly frightened by the fact that you're standing in front of my house in the middle of the night," she jokes with a smile.

"Oh good," I choke out a response, "I was actually just wondering if you were home."

I can't bring myself to tell her that I was actually just wondering what I could say to her to convince her we don't have to be 'just friends' anymore. But I'm obviously not going to say that. She would probably punch me in the gut for being so forward, right?

She waits for an explanation why I'm standing outside her house, and when I don't offer one, she instead asks, "Do you want to go for a walk?"

I nod once and we head off down the path. I see her glance my way, searching my face for a sign, as we head off the main path and toward the forest neighboring Berk.

"Well, what is it?" she asks with worry stitched in her voice.

"It's a lot of things, actually."

She nods and waits patiently for my explanation. She knows me well enough to know when to push answers out to me and when to let me take my time answering.

The wind picks up and she shivers. I take off my coat and silently pass it to her. Surprisingly, she takes the coat from my hands and puts it on; she must have really have been cold not to argue.

"Thanks, Hiccup."

We walk in silence for what seems like ages, our footfalls matching on the ground beneath us. The breeze is gathering and she smells like wildflowers. It's being shoved it into my senses until I feel like I am drowning. I don't know whether to hate it or love it.

"I'm worried," I'm still searching for the right words, "About ... us."

"Us?"

I nod. My mouth is nailed shut. I can't find the right words again.

"You don't have to worry," I can practically feel her smile, "We're a very good team. Dragon training, helping the village, rescuing dragons."

I don't quite have a response to that so I let her sentence hang in the night air as I search for the words. But I'm not good with words.

She eventually interoperates my silence and find the words for me, picking up my pieces and helping me out, as usual.

"But that's not what you meant, right?"

I nod, and we slow our pace.

"Can we sit?"

We sit on a nearby fallen log and stare at each other in the approaching darkness of the night. A moment passes, than another, another.

"Astrid, I worry about what will happen if I say what I want, if I say what I'm thinking, what I'm feeling," I pause, "Or worse, if I don't."

She takes a few moments to ponder my words, tucking herself into the side of my body for warmth. The smell of her, wildflowers and perfumed hair oil, are strangling me slowly, tightening around my neck. I don't think I can take this for much longer.

"Well, wouldn't it just be easier to just say it and get it over with?"

I want to tell her that I'm afraid. That I'm nervous. That I'm terrible with words and I could screw this up so easily. I want to tell her that she smells like wildflowers after it rains and that smell has been slowly murdering me for weeks now and the sound of her laugh makes me shiver. I want to tell her that her collarbone makes me weak and I want to kiss her neck and her ass makes my mind run wild. I want to tell her that her voice and her laugh and her very existence brighten my day better than anything else could.

But I can't find the words. I'm terrible at words. And this isn't a dream. I'll just have to go with the next best thing and wing it.

"Astrid—"

Oh, Gods, her voice and her touch and her perfume are tearing me apart. I can't take another minute of this. I meet your gaze with my own and it's killing me, I swear.

"Astrid, I love you."

There's a moment of silence before she quietly breathes, "Oh, is that all?"

It feels like my heart just exploded.

"Is that all?" I repeat.

My pent-up emotions have short-circuited the wires in my heart and, boom, the carcass of my heart is starting to rot in my rib cage. My brain has recorded her response to my confession and is replaying it over and over and over in my head with the volume turned up as loud as it can go.

"Is that all?" I repeat again, "Astrid, I take months to work up the courage to say that, try and try to find the right words, and all you ask is if that's all?"

I feel like screaming and running and bashing my head in with a stick. Dying now would solve all of my problems, right?

She leans her shoulder against mine.

"I love you, too. Didn't you already know that?"

This girl is… beyond me. Completely.

"So... that's it?"

"That's it."

"And we took… this long?"

"Yep."

"I—" she turns and kisses me full on the lips, stopping my sentence somewhere in the depths of my throat. All sane thought leaves my mind. She is soft and warm and she is wrapping her arms around my neck to pull me closer.

The next thing I know, it's been twenty minutes and I am walking her back home, hand-in-hand.

"I'll see you tomorrow?" I ask.

"Most likely," she teases me with a soft giggle and a playful squeeze of our intertwined hands.

If my smile were any bigger, it wouldn't fit on my face.

"Goodnight, Hiccup."

"Night, Astrid."

She wraps her arms around my neck and kiss me again, deep and long and much too short.

Maybe, one day, I'll find the right words. Then I can tell her every single thing I think about her. But, of course, this isn't a dream. And, for right now, my words are perfect.